Category Archives: NUL PAIN SANS PEINE

My two-weeks-ago-carefully-put-together outfit fell out due to one fact I had ignored when doing the sartorial maths. Luckily, I conjured the next outfit on the spot, as you would, and I still had enough time to check it out. Unluckily, the second outfit wasn’t good enough, either. I did tell you I had nothing to wear?!?!

Like in a fairy tale, it was the third outfit, born out of necessity (aka 5 minutes to go) that was good enough and made me feel well, so off I went.

Only to find myself in an old train half an hour later, wondering whether the 3 guys next to me were going to drink all that beer and what the strap of my brand new bag was doing down there. They didn’t, they were rather nice while sipping their beer, and the strap had gotten somehow detached from the bag – without my help.That something like this should happen!

So now what? What now so? Now what so?

Ahhh, my brain cell went, you have some safety pins in your kaputted bag – use them. So I did. The bag lasted till I made the first few steps in the small town I had been headed to.

Do you know Karstadt? It’s one of those warehouses that are going to be abolished because we all shop cheap things online these days (like bags). Anyway, there was a Karstadt near the venue I was headed for and they sold me a most lovely bag within minutes, made all the sympathetic noises while I told them about my stupid old bag, didn’t wince when I used their surfaces to empty the old bag and fill the new one and wished me a nice evening.

The thing is, I am very happy in my moosing cave and don’t really want to leave it for other people. On the other hand, I really want to get to know the people I am in daily e-mail contact with. It cannot hurt.

– I’m so tired. I have no idea why I couldn’t sleep last night. I just couldn’t. I was awake as hell and it was 5 am. I checked. Now I cannot live. So just hit me senseless next time. You’ll sleep better, too, afterwards. What with my tossing and turning.

It took me whole 60 seconds to find that out and say it. In my head, exclusively, I do have some pride. Now what? Wisely, I excluded the confession act as a possibility and gave it another try instead. And another one. I still couldn’t do it, but I walked on. Nothing else to do: I had claimed a few weeks ago, loudly and comprehensively, that I should be able to do it, so now it was too late to find out I couldn’t. So I walked on. Just like I’d do in real life, nothing new there for me.

Just before we started packing our rucksacks for a 3-day hiking tour, the rain had decided now was the time to act out the attention whore part and stick to it for some time. Of course it would, this is Sweden, for ticks’ sake! I could only hope my brand new Dalsland tan wouldn’t get rinsed off or mouldy till we get home. Home. Where the bed is. And the shower. Walk on.

Gradually, my body stopped hating me for carrying such a huge load for so long in such a rain and we made 8 kilometers that day. At the end of which, we discovered our first palace: they hadn’t bothered with the red carpet but painted the whole house red instead and inside, there were beds. And an oven. That day, I may or may not have believed in heaven on Earth …

We spent the next night in another red house saying “Germans go home” on one of its walls. Sorry to say we didn’t. We couldn’t. Not after 15 kilometers in the rain and half a ton on our backs. But thank you for the oven and all the wood.

– – –

“Where did you spend your holiday, if I may ask?” The repairman was nice and talkative, so I told him the truth: “In Sweden.” The tremor rattling his body could be seen: “Sweden? Isn’t it … cold and rainy up there?” He checked my chocolate tan again – it must have provoked his question in the first place – and decided to stick to his opinion: “And grey?”

“Yes, it is,” I lied (not wanting all the world and her wife to travel there next summer), “but then, at least there are no mosquitos when the weather’s bad. And it is still very beautiful, Sweden is.”

That’s true. While I was afraid I’d be missing Finland way too much, I found Glaskogen area to be quite similar to our beloved Finnish hiking grounds and that was enough. Oh, and: we had enough sun in Dalsland to enjoy a 5-day paddling tour in the first place.

Strange, though … this year no one exclaimed Spain’s gonna win as soon as they heard us talking German. At least I thought that was strange until I finally had a look at a comprehensible Swedish newspaper: it contained the words Spain, Chile and fiasco. I couldn’t believe it.